


Feeling

by bluesamutra



Series: Dust [4]
Category: The X-Files
Genre: Episode: s04e13 Never Again, Episode: s04e14 Memento Mori, Episode: s05e01-02 Redux, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-02
Updated: 2021-03-02
Packaged: 2021-03-15 12:02:13
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,078
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29808120
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bluesamutra/pseuds/bluesamutra
Summary: Scully struggles to come to terms with her changing relationship with Mulder
Relationships: Dana Scully/Other(s), Fox Mulder & Dana Scully, Fox Mulder/Dana Scully
Series: Dust [4]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2190777
Kudos: 20





	Feeling

The floor to ceiling light box casts the room in a fluorescent glow and Scully scrutinizes the stark tabloid sized films of her skull. She can name every bone, learned by rote over ten years ago, but she can't quite believe she's standing here. That after everything she and Mulder have been through, it's something as pedestrian as cancer that will kill her. If she ever thought about it before, and it really wasn't something she thought about often, she imagined a bullet being the only thing that would fell her in her youth. More often, she imagined she'd live until she was old, slipping away in her sleep at the age of eighty-two like her grandmother, who cruised the world on the QE2 for her last three years and retired to bed every evening, including the one she died, with a glass of sherry in one hand and a copy of To Kill a Mockingbird in the other. 

He'll be here soon, she thinks, wishing for a moment that she could freeze time and he would never arrive. She'd left a message for him last night on the office answering machine, asking him to meet her at Holy Cross this morning, and when he'd returned her call a few minutes ago to say he was on his way, she'd gutlessly let it go to voicemail. She hasn't spoken to him since Friday night, and honestly they didn't really do much talking then. 

A dull throb pulses behind her sinuses, a hint of things to come, and Scully presses her fingers against her forehead, shutting her eyes against the burn of tears.

She'd done the same thing on Friday night standing in Hegel Place's shabby elevator, when she clamped her eyes shut to ward off the tears that threatened to spill down her cheeks, and her thighs closed to prevent Mulder's semen from reaching her knees. 

That night had been fucked up, even for her. Them. Whatever.

She'd stood there wondering how she was going to look him in the eye on Monday and been scared to catch sight of her own reflection in the scuffed steel lining of the car. When she had, a wide- eyed woman with tousled hair and a chalk-white face stared back at her.

Mulder had said he didn't know what was going on with her and though it would shock him to hear her agree with him, this time he had a point. She'd gone four years without sex and in the space of two weeks she'd been with as many men. She'd half-heartedly wondered if this was an example of the 'uncharacteristic behavior' the oncologist had warned her she might experience as her disease progressed, but deep down she knew it had been building for a while.

She'd pressed her back against the side of the car and the grab rail had dug painfully into her back, aggravating what she'd suspected was the beginning of a nasty bruise where Mulder's fingers had bit into her hip as he thrust her into his hardwood floor.

Her eyes had focused through the sheen of tears and she realized she hadn't pressed the button for the ground floor. Her throat had constricted around a strangled laugh that sounded more like a sob and she stabbed the down button with a shaking hand.

Her hand shakes now as she pulls the x-ray from the light box and bracing herself for what's about to come.

"Scully?" 

She turns round at Mulder's hesitant voice from the doorway and he walks towards her with a bunch of flowers. Their eyes meet briefly and she can see apprehension and apology mixed, and she knows the same emotions are mirrored in her own eyes. 

"I uh, stole these from some guy with a broken leg down the hall. He uh, won't be able to catch me." His is face sluggish with dread but he tries to smile as he holds out the flowers and she ducks her head, smiling too. For a split second she can almost pretend none of this is really happening, but Mulder's voice turns serious, "How ya doing?"

"I guess that's the question," she says ruefully but at his nervous nod she reassures him, "Actually I feel fine."

Mulder pauses, nodding, while he digests this and she can see the question on his face, wondering if she *they* are fine too. Her head bobs in reassurance and she lets her eyes linger on his face. 

As frustrated as she was with him before Philadelphia. As frustrated as she has been for a long time with his ditches, his ordering her around; with his obtuseness and his obsessiveness, whilst her own focus on life narrowed and narrowed until it was all about him, she knows he will be here for her now. There is no one other than Mulder, may never be anyone else, and in this moment, in this room, she is okay with that.

Mulder's eyes flick between her face and the light box, "What uh, what exactly are we looking at here?"

This part she can do, this part she trained for years for, and she slips comfortably and detachedly into the role as Dr. Scully. "It's what's called nasopharyngeal mass. It's a small growth between the superior concha and the sphenoidal sinus."

"A growth?"

"A tumor."

Their eyes meet again and his face seems pale with fear. She wants to say something that will comfort him, something to acknowledge what has happened between them and reaffirm their bond, but when she opens her mouth to speak all she can think of is, "You're the only one I've called."

"Is it operable?" He asks with warm brown eyes which search hers for the truth.

"No," she whispers and she feels like her spine has turned to ice. 

"But it's treatable."

And the ice starts to melt; she breathes in through her nose to steady herself and refuses to flinch. "The truth is that the type and placement of the tumor make it difficult, to the extreme."

"I refuse to believe that, I..."

Oh Mulder, she thinks, if only hope could heal the world. And me. She cuts him off, a ghost of a smile fleeting on her lips, "For all the times I have said that to you, I am as certain of this as you have ever been."

Mulder quirks his head in question and her voice drops a decibel as she confirms what he already knows but is afraid to believe, "I have cancer. It is a mass on the wall between my sinus and cerebrum. If it pushes into my brain statistically there is about zero chance of survival."

"I don't accept that. Th..there must be some people who have received treatment for this, we..can...." Mulder, so sure of himself always, stammers in the face of her mortality.

Scully sighs, steeling herself for the road ahead and she pictures Betsy Higopian and the other Allentown women, their faces grey with death. Her voice, when she answers, is stronger than she feels inside. "Yes there are."

***

"Fuck, fuck, fuck, it's so fucking good."

Scully's eyes snap open as Mulder groans underneath her and his fingers bite into the flesh of her hips, dragging her against him. With each painfully slow thrust his cock smacks against her cervix and her uterus clenches in anticipation. Sweat covers her skin in a fine sheen and the hiss of their ragged breathing and the wet sounds of their bodies moving together ratchets her own arousal up a notch. "Yeah, it is," she breathes in agreement.

Mulder's eyes flick to hers and his gaze is so penetrating she has to look away, her head dropping forward to watch her hands slide over his chest, fingernails scratching at the sparse hair on his sternum. When they are joined like this and he looks at her like that, it almost feels like he can see inside to her soul, and she's scared of what he might find there.

Letting go of one hip he slides a calloused hand along her leg, fingers dancing over the sensitive skin on her inner thigh as he reaches for her center. His thumb hits home with unnerving accuracy and her breath catches in her throat as he rubs tight circles around her clit. Her flesh is swollen and slick and there is almost no friction but he presses against her firmly, rolling the hard nub around under his thumb. 

She can tell he's close by the tenseness of his muscles and she concentrates on the sensations traversing her body, focusing on her approaching orgasm. Mulder launches himself forward, stomach muscles rippling under her hands, to suck her right nipple into his mouth. He seems to know just the right amount of pressure to apply, before letting her hard nipple slip out of his mouth and laving the puckered flesh with the flat of his tongue. Sliding her hands into his hair, she cradles him against her breast.

Last year when they did this there was no other way to describe it than fucking. She had known as he pulled her to the floor and sank his teeth into her neck that he wanted to wipe any trace of Ed Jerse from her mind, and even though fucking Fox Mulder was something she had promised herself she would not do, in that instant she wanted him to make her forget. She wanted to forget about the stagnancy of her life, the unnerving disquiet and sense of confinement that had driven her from his basement office into another man's arms. Was it spite that had made her accept the date with Ed? Maybe, but it was melancholy which led her to that dank bar to drink vodka tonics and confess her malaise to a stranger. It was vindication which sparked in her mind when the needle buzzed painfully into the soft skin of her back. And it was desperation for human contact that made her kiss Ed back even though her mind screamed 'no'.

She just wanted to *feel*. But as she lay on the floor next to Ed after five minutes of truly mediocre sex, she found that feel was the one thing she could not do. Her heart, her stomach, her mind were numb; leaden in her body. As Ed helped her to her feet and led her to his bed, pressing a shirt on her to sleep in, she saw it was obvious even to him. She was dead inside.

He slept on the sofa. 

But two weeks later, on the same day she found out she was dying, Mulder made her feel more alive than she had in years and tonight she is strong and healthy, and a barrage of feeling courses through her body as Mulder scrapes his teeth over her nipple.

Her thighs burn and her pelvis bubbles with the delicious promise of climax as she thrusts against Mulder. She pulls his lips to hers, sweeping her tongue into his alcohol soaked mouth and she is coming, her body contracting hard around him as he surges into her one last time and spills inside her, her name on his lips.

The first few moments as their pulses slow and their skin cools are the best. Soon enough, as she hears Mulder's breathing slip into the steady cadence of the sleeping and his caressing hand falls still on her back, her conscience stirs. The unforgiving voice of reason in her head condemns her for her weakness, for succumbing once again to her desire to feel. And for Mulder. 

She can no longer pretend to herself that there could be anyone else, but she can't say the same for him. His loyalty to her had been profound and enduring, but his willingness to disregard her mistrust of Diana had shaken her to the core. There is nothing she would not do for Mulder; on her deathbed, when the only gift she had left to give him was her reputation, she had willingly placed it in his hands. This rift between them over Diana had reaffirmed what she already knew to be true: their partnership was of paramount importance to her. Maintaining that took priority over everything else, and if she were to let herself fall in love with him, it would be all too easy to lose sight of herself. And there was already so little of her left.


End file.
